Tag Archive for The Current

I was told about the below article earlier by a colleague, and wanted to post it for our readers. I believe that it connects with the type of work we are doing here at The West Coast Men’s Support Society. Our Dads Make A Difference program is a support group for new dads and fathers in crisis. We are very interested in bringing this group to communities across BC because of situations that this segment of CBC’s The Current highlights.

Today, The Current comes to you from the Yukon Art Centre before a live audience to discuss a topic hiding in plain sight but rarely mentioned Fathers Without Fathers — Aboriginal Men In Canada.

In this special forum we hear from the first Canadian academic to start tracking Aboriginal men … Aboriginal fathers. We meet others working with Men who grew up without their dads and who want a different life for their own kids. And we hear from the audience as we explore this issue.

We’re in the North because Yukon Northwest Territories and Nunavut have the highest percentage of people with an Aboriginal ancestry. But this is an issue that has implications across First Nations communities and across our wider country.

PT 1: Absent Aboriginal Fathers

There are many statistics. The percentage of Aboriginal children being raised by a single parent — usually the mother — is double the percentage of other Canadian children. One in 5 First Nations women over the age of 15 is a single mom. And if statistics don’t change, a growing number of Aboriginal boys will typically become absent dads themselves. We hear from CBC Reporter, Geoff Leo who has been looking into this story and from a professor at the School of Child and Youth Care at the University of Victoria

We continue to take about Aboriginal fathers – a demographic that has been called the greatest untapped resource in the lives of aboriginal children. That quote from Ed John, Grand Chief of the First Nations Summit in British Columbia. We hear from two people working with Aboriginal men – anxious to find new purpose in their lives, and the lives of their children.